Writing & Beer, Not Necessarily In That Order

Sooo…it’s NaNoWriMo time. Again. Now, maybe I’m the only writer in the world who feels this way, but…really? What the hell is that syllabic mishmash supposed to be?

If I can’t be bothered to write during the other eleven months of the year, why would November be any different?

Shit, November is the last month in which I should be writing seriously. October is home to more beer-focused events and festivals than any other time of the year. And December? Well, what the hell is Christmas except family stress and waaay too much booze? I don’t know about your family, but with mine…well, let’s just say that family harmony starts and ends at the liquor cabinet.

Honestly, November ain’t for writing, it’s for giving my liver a fighting chance to survive.

If I haven’t been clear enough: I barely know NaNoWriMo is a thing, and I certainly have never taken part.

I know, I know, there are a ton of other writers out there who love the damned concept. Giddyup, yippee-ki-yay, have-at-it….I’ll never really get it, but boats are floated by many, many things.

Okay, so enough venting and griping. But…but…NaNoWriMo…really? Why is this a thing?

I can only put this in personal terms: writing is who I am, not what I do. If ever I am not writing, there is a problem. If ever I go more than a few days without keys clicking, or pen in hand, then my life has very much taken a turn for the worst.

I can’t think, can’t process, can’t function, without writing. How the hell could I ever say, “No, let’s wait until November”…? Even in Yellowstone, amidst all that distraction, I wrote better than 25,000 words…more like 35,000 if you count the blog posts and other stuff I wrote up there. And still there is a backlog of stuff in my head — and in my soul.

So, to answer the IWSG question for this month: no, I have never written anything for NaNoWriMo. Or, more accurately, I’ve written a shit-ton in November, but because those stories — those words — demanded to be written, not because some artificial Twitter-drive told me it was time to “buckle down”.

What spurs me to write is, more than anything else, an internal thing. I write for me. If others like my stuff, then I’ll do the happy-dance…but even if I end up exactly as my family expects — and let’s not get started on that particular demon, shall we? — still will I write.

To (mis)quote a song: I don’t stutter when I write.

The thoughts and the words, well, they carry and express themselves…and that is, for me, how it has to be. That is the how and why of writing for me — not because the calendar tells me it is time, but because I simply can’t stop. Not and stay “me”.